Mark Tower, a Master Mason in Wareham’s Social Harmony Lodge, says that you shouldn’t believe everything you read on the internet. 

According to online conspiracy theorists, the Freemasons are a shadowy cabal of masterminds who control the world from behind the scenes.

“It’s all nonsense,” said Tower, who has been a Freemason for 12 years.

Such conspiracies are not unique to the internet. Rumors about the Freemasons, “the world’s largest and oldest fraternal organization,” have existed in America since the early 19th century. 

Speaking at the Methodist Meeting House on Monday, Feb. 20, Tower recounted the true 200-year history of the Social Harmony Lodge.

The presentation was sponsored by the Wareham Historical Society. 

“I guess because I like to read old documents and look through the closets of [the Lodge], I have become their historian,” Tower said. 

Tower had some of those old documents with him. There were diplomas given to Masons who have achieved  prestigious “third degree” status, and a copy of the Lodge’s original charter (the actual charter is only brought out when a new Worshipful Master, the overseer of the Lodge, is sworn in). 

The diplomas featured various Masonic symbols, such as an eye in the sky representing God. When asked to explain other images on the diploma, Tower said that their meaning was “privy to members.” 

Tower said that the goal of Freemasonry is not world domination but self improvement. 

“It is not to cut and refine stone,” he said, “but to refine ourselves.”

Anyone can become a Freemason, as long as they are a man. Tower’s father and grandfather were both Masons.

“It was all in the family,” he said. “It was something I was always intending to do, and I wish I did it sooner. It’s a brotherhood between men you would otherwise never meet.” 

Freemasonry has allowed Tower to meet many people in Wareham and across Massachusetts. 

Freemasonry first arrived in Massachusetts in 1733, when English tailor Henry Price founded the state’s first Masonic Lodge in Boston. 

The Social Harmony Lodge had its beginnings in Middleboro. In 1823, a group of men petitioned the King David Lodge in Taunton for the right to form their own lodge. 

In those days, the fee for initiation was $15, or $427.39 in today’s money. 

The first secretary of the Social Harmony Lodge was a man named Gamaliel Rounseville. His cousin five times removed, Robert Cook, was secretary until his death last week. 

Contrary to popular belief, the Lodge moved to Wareham not due to anti-Masonic sentiment, but because the men of Wareham wanted to form their own lodge, but did not have permission to do so. 

From then on, men from Wareham’s most prominent families would join the Lodge to make political, professional and personal connections.

“When men of varying backgrounds are able to come together for a common purpose,” Tower said, “it can solve a lot of problems.” 

Many Lodge members served their country in wars throughout America’s history, and the Lodge gives back to the community to this day. Tower said that the Lodge does not publicize its philanthropy because it is a fraternity, not a charity.

“Charity in its original form was not about giving money or goods,” he said. “When we talk about charity, we’re talking about brotherly love.”